At six in the evening the shutters come down on Euljiro (을지로). The presses stop, the handcarts go inside, and the tile wholesalers and tool shops that have supplied Seoul’s builders since the war lock up for the night. By nine the staircases beside them are busy. Three floors up, behind a door with nothing on it, there’s a room with a dozen seats and the tube lights still on the ceiling.
Koreans call it Hipjiro (힙지로), hip Euljiro, half in affection and half in irony, and both halves are earned. It’s Seoul’s most interesting night out because nobody planned it as one: small, unsigned bars and listening rooms grew in the upper floors of a working industrial district, and the district is still working underneath them. It’s also on a clock, which is the other reason to go soon.
Hipjiro Grew Upstairs From a Working District
Euljiro runs east from City Hall through the old industrial heart of central Seoul, rebuilt after the Korean War into a dense ecosystem of micro manufacturing: print shops, lighting stores, metalworkers and sewing machine dealers, each alley its own supply chain. Its nightlife was strictly functional. Marie Claire Korea counted about 80 dabang (다방, tea rooms) here in the 1970s and 80s and a well known nightclub called Holiday, and later came the nogari alley beer halls, where workers drank cheap lager over dried pollack after a shift. Nobody came to Euljiro for atmosphere. Euljiro was where atmosphere got manufactured for everywhere else.
The turn came in the mid 2010s, for the classic reason: cheap upstairs rents in a district the city had scheduled for redevelopment. Artists took studios above the tool shops. Then came the bars, unsigned on purpose, up staircases that still smell of machine oil, in rooms that kept the tube lights and the linoleum because the look was already right. The people opening them were actors, designers and musicians, BizHankook reported in 2019. Stage actor Kang Yun-seok (강윤석) roasts at Coffee Hanyakbang (커피한약방), an old herbal medicine shop conversion that proved the district could draw a daytime crowd. Cocktail rooms and natural wine bars followed, and by the late 2010s Instagram had done the rest.
Hipjiro is Seoul’s answer to Montreal’s Mile End: raw space converted faster than the city could rezone it, the same pattern I trace in the club map. Kyunghyang caught the switch in 2023: presses and forklifts by day, and by night alleys that turn into another world, where a sign that says print shop turns out to be a skewer bar.
The Nogari Alley Is Where the Night Starts
In summer, nogari (노가리, dried pollack) with draft beer on plastic stools in the middle of the road is one of the great Seoul experiences, and it costs almost nothing. It’s also the most local thing in the district, and the place to begin before you go looking for a staircase.
The pairing is credited to Eulji OB Bear (을지OB베어), which Kang Hyo-geun (강효근) opened in 1980 as the first franchise of Dongyang Beer. His daughter Kang Ho-sin (강호신) was still running it through an eviction fight in 2019, Seoul Shinmun reported. The alley was named Seoul Future Heritage in 2015, but that didn’t save the bar. After losing its lease case at every level of the courts, it was forcibly evicted on 21 April 2022, on the sixth attempt, as Weekly Kyunghyang documented, and the fight became a preservation cause. It reopened in February 2024, according to Esquire Korea, and it’s on the map below.
The city has noticed the crowds. A Seoul Metropolitan Government press release of 15 July 2026 names Jongno 3-ga (종로3가) and Euljiro as the places where outdoor drinking, yajang (야장), has become a draw, acknowledges the noise, rubbish and pavement complaints that come with it, and says the city will move from crackdowns to a managed model, with five Seoul Moonlight Yajang (서울 달빛야장) pilots in 2026 and 25 by 2028. When the first sites were picked in September, none of them was in Euljiro, even though the plan named it as the inspiration.
Euljiro, From OB Bear to the Cranes
How the print and tool quarter became Hipjiro, and what redevelopment is taking, drawn to scale
을지로, 힙지로가 되기까지
How to do a night hereCome out at Euljiro 3-ga, search 노가리골목 on Naver Map or Kakao Map, and budget time for getting lost. It is not a 4am district.
- 11980Eulji OB Bear opens One of OB's first franchises, credited with pairing nogari and draft beer
- 22015Seoul Future Heritage For the nogari and draft beer culture of the alley. Outdoor tables follow in May 2017
- 3Mid 2010sHipjiro begins Unsigned bars up the stairs of workshop buildings, opened by actors, designers and musicians
- 4Apr 2022OB Bear is evicted After six attempts
- 5Jul 2025The Sewoon park plan advances A first temporary park is approved
- 6Oct 2025Height limit raised to 145 metres On the Cheonggyecheon side of Sewoon zone 4, beside Jongmyo
- 7Sep 2026Time Out crowns Jongno 3-ga The coolest neighbourhood in the world
The price of a nogari. 17 draft beer bars along 465 metres of alley. Track runs from ₩0 to ₩1,500.
3rd to 1st Jongno 3-ga in Time Out's coolest neighbourhoods, 2021 to 2026.
6 sites, none here. Seoul picked its first Moonlight Yajang night market sites on 14 September 2026. The plan named Euljiro as its inspiration, but none of the six is in Jongno or Jung-gu.
Sources: Weekly Kyunghyang · Time Out · SBS Biz
The Music Lives in Small Listening Rooms
Euljiro has never had a megaclub, and it barely has a proper club. What it gives Seoul nightlife is the room built for listening: listening bars with serious systems, vinyl rooms run by collectors, gallery spaces that host one night parties under exhibition permits, and art spaces where experimental programming fits because nothing about the room suggests commerce. The coffee rave circuit likes it here for the same reason.
The rooms that last here are the ones built for listening. The Listening Zone opened at Local Stitch (로컬스티치) in 2021, as HEYPOP covered. The Edge Seoul (디 엣지), a room for about 80 on Eulji-ro 12-gil, is the closest the district comes to a club. The DJs were drawn by the same thing as everyone else. Antoine, who DJs as Odd J and started Clique Records with Curtis, told Marie Claire Korea: “을지로에는 ‘리얼 피플’의 진짜 삶이 있어요” (Euljiro has real people living real lives).
The numbers are still small. In the 2025 survey, Euljiro registered 5 percent as a preferred going out district, tiny beside Itaewon, but five years ago it would have polled at zero.
Success Is Pushing the Scene East
Euljiro has been discovered, thoroughly, and some of what’s there now is a bar that has read about Euljiro bars. The tell is simple. If the unmarked door has a queue and a photographer, it’s no longer the thing it’s imitating. The rooms still worth the walk are the ones where the owner is behind the bar and nobody is documenting anything.
Every scene needs a district where rent forgives experiments, the role HBC played for the last generation. Euljiro plays it for this one, with a visible clock. Columnist Lee Kwang-pyo described the two faces of Hipjiro for Kyunghyang in 2023: the old trades that made it interesting, and the crowds that are slowly pricing them out, the same squeeze that took so many venues before. The redevelopment that kept the rents cheap is now arriving, with towers approved beside Jongmyo (종묘) and a park planned where the Sewoon Sangga (세운상가) arcades stand. I’ve written up what’s being lost, and how to see it first, in The Print Alleys Under Hipjiro.
The bars are adapting the way bars always do, by moving. Esquire Korea tracked the next wave east to Sindang-dong (신당동), where the cocktail bar Jushindang (주신당) and others opened near the old market, and argued it wasn’t a second Euljiro because people still live there. Gu Seoul (구 서울), on the second floor at 82 Majang-ro, builds its changing cocktail menu from Sindang Central Market ingredients. The attention is spreading north too. Time Out named Jongno 3-ga the coolest neighbourhood in the world for 2026, and a café owner it quoted on Seosulla-gil (서순라길), beside Jongmyo, said the lane has become a premier destination for yajang.
How to Do a Night in Euljiro
Go late, but not too late. The good rooms fill from about nine, and the interesting hours are between ten and one. Come out at Euljiro 3-ga Station (을지로3가역) on Lines 2 and 3, and type 을지로 or 노가리골목 (nogari golmok, the nogari alley) into Naver Map or Kakao Map rather than trusting Google Maps. Euljiro isn’t a 4am district the way Itaewon is.
Budget time to get lost. The bars are unsigned on purpose, often on a third floor up a staircase with nothing on the door, and finding them takes longer than you think. Rooms are tiny, twelve to twenty seats as a rule, so a group of eight that turns up without asking spends the evening on a landing. Start in the nogari alley, then pick one upstairs room and stay a while.
Go once on a weekday afternoon too. Walk the print alleys while the presses are running, then come back at night. You’ll never see the district the same way again.
Every venue is on the map below, with what’s on over the next two weeks and Naver and Kakao links in each pin.
Euljiro and Sindang nightlife map
Venues on this map (4)
- The Edge Seoul 디 엣지Bar · 8 Eulji-ro 12-gil네이버 지도 Naver Map카카오맵 Kakao Map
- Jushindang 주신당Bar · 399 Toegye-ro네이버 지도 Naver Map카카오맵 Kakao Map
- Eulji OB Bear 을지OB베어Bar · 49-2 Chungmu-ro네이버 지도 Naver Map카카오맵 Kakao Map
- Gu Seoul 구 서울Cocktail bar · 2F, 82 Majang-ro, Jung-gu (Sindang)네이버 지도 Naver Map카카오맵 Kakao Map
한국어 요약
힙지로 (을지로) 밤 즐기는 법
힙지로는 인쇄소와 조명 가게가 모인 을지로 골목 안에 생긴 바 문화를 부르는 별명입니다. 간판 없는 작은 바가 오래된 건물 위층에 숨어 있습니다.
잘못된 정보나 바뀐 날짜를 발견하셨나요? 연락 주시면 확인 후 바로 고치겠습니다. 현장에서 보고 들은 이야기도 언제나 환영합니다.
Directions to the rooms in this guide 길찾기
- The Edge Seoul 디 엣지Euljiro네이버 지도 Naver Map카카오맵 Kakao Map
- Jushindang 주신당Euljiro네이버 지도 Naver Map카카오맵 Kakao Map
- Eulji OB Bear 을지OB베어Euljiro네이버 지도 Naver Map카카오맵 Kakao Map
- Gu Seoul 구 서울Euljiro네이버 지도 Naver Map카카오맵 Kakao Map
Frequently Asked Questions
What’s Hipjiro?
Hipjiro (힙지로) is the nickname for the bar scene that grew up inside Euljiro (을지로), a working industrial district in central Seoul known for printing, lighting and small manufacturing. The bars are typically small, unsigned and on the upper floors of ageing commercial buildings. The district’s industry is what kept the rents low and gave the bars their look.
Why are Euljiro bars hidden and unmarked?
Partly the look and partly practical. The rooms are upper floors of working commercial buildings rather than shopfronts, so they were never meant to be seen from the street, and a low profile suited the rents and the small capacity. Finding them became part of the appeal, then part of the branding.
When should you go to Euljiro?
Evenings from about nine, with the best hours between ten and one. It isn’t a late night district the way Itaewon is. Rooms often seat twelve to twenty, so groups should check ahead. In summer, beer and nogari at the street tables in the nogari alley is the signature experience, and a weekday afternoon walk through the working print alleys is worth doing separately.
Further Reading
- From the glass booth to the DJ booth: the dabang to club lineage
- The Seoul nightlife glossary
- Wikipedia: Euljiro, the central Seoul street that gives the district its name
- Wikipedia: Seun Sangga, the electronics and workshop complex at the heart of the district
- Wikipedia: Jung District, the central Seoul ward that contains Euljiro
- Wikipedia: Cheonggyecheon, the restored stream beside the Euljiro workshop alleys
- VISITKOREA: the Korea Tourism Organization guide for planning a visit
Sources
Time Out Seoul, Exploring Euljiro
Marie Claire Korea, 2016 을지로 웨이브 (2016)
Segye Ilbo, on Euljiro redevelopment (2023)
KCI journal article on artists and studios in Euljiro
BizHankook, how Hipjiro started (2019)
Kyunghyang, Lee Kwang-pyo on 을지로의 밤 (2023)
Weekly Kyunghyang, the OB Bear eviction (2022)
Seoul Shinmun, the OB Bear eviction fight (April 2022)
Esquire Korea, Euljiro and OB Bear’s return (2024)
Weekly Kyunghyang, the nogari alley and the price of a nogari (2022)
SBS Biz, the first Moonlight Yajang sites (September 2026)
HEYPOP, Listening Zone at Local Stitch (2021)
Esquire Korea, Sindang-dong is not a second Euljiro (2023)
Time Out, Jongno 3-ga, the coolest neighbourhood in the world in 2026 (17 September 2026)
Written from Seoul, by someone who has been in the booth for more than twenty years. More on the site, or book a DJ.
Watch and listen: Euljiro at twilight, Seoul Walker
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